Part 19 (1/2)

'How can that be so, Anfen?'

'Shapers follow no order. They roam, they move to whatever spells they see, then do their work. Bigger spells take them longer, sometimes occupying many of them for a long time.'

'Why do you bring me here, Anfen?'

'To warn you. If you use foreign airs, Avridis, you will cause foreign shapers to come. Ones from beyond World's End. Already some are here, though for now very few. They read a different language of instructions. They will alter spells already cast in our realm, but not yet made reality. Here, in the quiet.'

The Arch Mage nodded. 'Which means if they alter spells already cast ...'

'They will alter the past. They will change everything. It is how Vous made Shadow real, and made him part of a common history.'

'Is Shadow here?'

'He can come here whenever he wishes.' Anfen gazed into his human eye and spoke not to the Arch Mage, but to Avridis, the young man who ignored the warnings of mages and wizards long ago, and provoked them into banis.h.i.+ng a promising student from their temples. 'You have created something you shouldn't have,' said Anfen. 'With your knowledge you alone can now help make the damage less. It's why I have not yet cut the life from you, as every part of me thirsts to do.'

The Arch Mage nodded to show he understood. His mind immediately went to the canisters of chilled foreign air, in near-complete purity, sitting in storage. And he knew he held a weapon to Anfen's head, and had all of Levaal at his mercy. But he had first to get back to the familiar realm where he could cast to defend himself.

So he listened to all of Anfen's warnings, his instructions to call back the war mages and to forbid them to cast anything until the foreign airs had dissipated. He even hung his head as though ashamed of his deeds. Privately he reflected with amus.e.m.e.nt on how those with tender consciences a.s.sumed that, deep down, others were ultimately the same. So very wrong.

When Anfen finally took him back, he immediately cast a spell which kept his likeness here on the steps like a puppet, while he fled to the safety of the castle, and controlled his puppet from a distance. A useful trick, one that had saved him from Vous's rages many times. He ordered the elite guards to stand down and leave them be.

'As you have taught me, I shall teach you something of value,' he said when they had gone, and he explained about the foreign magic he had captured with airs.h.i.+ps when the wall was destroyed. Anfen listened, seeming more weary and sick than ever. 'So I have a quest for you, Anfen. My enemies are now your enemies, and they have stolen Aziel. Find her, and bring her to me. Or I will empty what foreign power I have into Vous's chamber. All at once. What effect this will have in our realm, I don't know. Do you?'

Anfen did not answer.

'But now we both know what it will do in the quiet. Thank you for the lesson on magic. I am sorry you find yourself serving me again.'

When Anfen rushed forward and cut the Arch Mage down, the body did not bleed it vanished into a sheet of mist and he heard mocking laughter.

A VISITOR.

1.

Well into the following morning Aziel still slept where she'd fallen and the necklace's secrets remained untold.

On the upper floor, Stranger took what Gorb had caught in the nearby woods two fat birds, three rabbits and laid them all out on the platform. 'He is starting to worry me down there,' she said, referring to Far Gaze, who had watched Aziel constantly as though her every breath was of great importance.

'Stand back, s.h.i.+eld your eyes,' she said. There was a flash not unlike a camera's. When it faded the meat was skinned and cooked golden. 'Don't tell the other mages I did that,' she said, pa.s.sing the meat around to Eric and Gorb.

'Why not?'

'They're afraid there's something bad in the airs. They don't want much casting.'

'That red stuff?' said Eric, squinting at the dark glimmering ribbon that wound over their heads and trailed out the rear window. 'There isn't any of it there any more.'

'It's clean enough now.' Stranger plucked a thread out with her finger and wound it around like string, till it broke and dissipated. 'But you can see by the way the magic behaves that something is not right. There are ripples and strange movements.'

Bald was pouring water from a rusty metal jug over his seven wildly varying versions of the gun.

'That's enough,' Eric said. He s.n.a.t.c.hed the Glock out of Bald's hands and put it back in the shoulder holster.

Bald shrieked, tried to bite him, tattled to Gorb. 'I know where you sleep,' he hissed.

'Hush, Bald,' said Gorb.

Bald pointed at Eric like a prosecuting attorney. Spit flew from his mouth. 'You would have to expand his being. He will observe in a seat above the world, strapped in hanging, effects of deeds, effects throughout ages stretched, each dependent on innocent deeds about them as a demon skipping on dry rocks across a river-'

'Bald, hush up and do your work,' said Gorb sternly. 'No one wants to hear that stuff. It doesn't mean anything anyhow.'

'One day the poison shall be expelled!' Bald shrieked in anguish. He went back to sprinkling drops of water over his creations like someone watering plants, glowering murderously at Eric.

'Those guns he's making, they're sort of alive,' Gorb explained. 'That's why he's watering em. He couldn't figure out what makes the trigger send out the what did you call it?'

'Bullet.'

'Yeah. So it was easier to bring a part of the gadgets to life,' said Gorb. His fat lips pulled the meat from a poultry shank with one quick suck. Big hunks of it showed in his teeth when he spoke. 'He's been trying to work out how smart to make them. Enough so the guns understand what they're meant to do: shoot. But not so smart they can decide if they want to obey or not.'

'Can he bring any object he wants to life?' said Eric.

'Sure, if he finds the right airs.' Gorb chewed up the poultry bone as though it were a biscuit with three crunching bites then swallowed the bone chips. 'He could bring a chair alive, say. But why? It wouldn't do much. And you'd need to look after it. Food or water or firelight, whatever it needed. If you didn't, it'd die and fall apart. No one wants a chair like that.'

'How's he do it?'

'Only Engineers know,' said Gorb sagely. 'You saw them dolls we did. Weren't easy to make, took us ages to find the airs. But there's good airs here, I guess.' Eric was newly nervous to learn the crazed little man had such powers. 'You did good to make him mad, just now,' said Gorb. 'He's trying to make the alive part of the guns so they're always angry. Why else would they want to shoot at something? Now he's putting the anger you gave him into the guns.'

'How long till they're ready to fire?'

'They're almost ready now,' said Gorb. At Eric's look of disbelief, he said, 'Yep, all we need's to make some bullets. Rocks we can sharpen, maybe. Something that'll fit in those what do you call em? Barrels.'

'You can see why Engineers are prized property,' said Stranger.

Eric said, 'Why didn't it occur to anyone in this world to make guns before now?'

'As It wills,' she said, shrugging. She took the sc.r.a.ps and bones as though to toss them out the window, but Gorb took them from her and shovelled them into his mouth, devouring the lot. 'Such a weapon was not part of this world until you brought it here,' said Stranger. 'Just as past Pilgrims brought versions of all other weapons we use. The gun had no place here until you came. Now yours is here, it can be made real and copied. You should bring more things, if you ever return to Otherworld.'

'Stones!' Bald screamed. 'I need stones! Bring stones!' He clawed at his own face, opening up the grooves dug in the last time he was worked up. Blood poured down his cheeks.

'I'll get them,' said Stranger.

When she'd gone down the steps Gorb remembered he was meant to watch her. 'Eric, I better stay with Bald. Sometimes he hurts himself bad enough to nearly die. Can you go with her? Make sure she comes back like Far Gaze asked me? You got your gun back now.'

'I don't think I'll need it for her,' he said, standing. And I don't know that it will be much use if Shadow returns. But its weight in the holster rea.s.sured him nonetheless. He loaded it then followed her.